The Campaign For DA

7.12.2017

A Southwest flight had to return to Austin yesterday when two passengers got into a fight. I haven't seen a video of it yet. There's a lot of aggression out there.

"The new home market is booming once again in the sprawling Northwest school district, prompting officials to purchase land for six new schools, including two high schools." It is amazing to believe that Northwest ISD was once a tiny little thing with one high school in the UIL district of Decatur and Bridgeport.

Although it has not hit 100 degrees, this summer feels hotter than any in the last decade. It's sauna-like out there.

I can't decide if I like the Miami baseball park where the All-Star Game was played last night or not. It is so ridiculous that I lean towards like.

For those interested in Texas county government and criminal law: Travis County just voted to spend a bunch of money for the DA's office to appeal a case to the U.S. Supreme Court. The case involves law which I have never heard of before. An Austin officer, but who was part of a joint Federal/State task force, killed a guy in the course of duty but the DA's office thought it was manslaughter. They indicted him in state court. Using a federal law which is new to me, the officer was able to stop the prosecution and remove the case to federal court where it was dismissed by a federal district judge because there's a weird immunity statute that applies to criminal prosecution under the statute. After the Fifth Circuit affirmed the dismissal, the money was approved to hire an outside counsel to help the DA's office with the appeal. But get this: They hired a former Texas Supreme Court judge (which means he has qualifications of being able to get elected and specializing in Texas civil law) to help with the case which, once again, involves nothing but federal law. And how much will he be paid? $30,000 plus $900 an hour. Keep in mind the DA's office has an army of appellate lawyers who are paid by taxpayers to handle appeals.

The Ticket's signal was horrible yesterday and they said the station's tower was in Decatur. I didn't know that. (I think it is actually north of Decatur.)

I had a random call out of the blue from an old friend who is an avid Blog reader. He also is part owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers. I hadn't heard from him in 20 years, but he just wanted to say hi.

Not a peep from the White House that the New York Times is "fake news" yesterday after the stories from the New York Times turned to be deadly accurately. Then this morning Trump is at it again. Probably something else is about to drop:

The pastor of the First Baptist of Dallas has not pulled his support for Trump as evidenced yesterday:

It's a bad sign for the country when the talking heads on radio and TV are arguing about the definition of "Treason." But this going around yesterday at least made me smile for a bit:

BagOfNothing turned me on to a Twitter account that focuses on the ridiculous signs that would pop up in the old Batman TV show. Here, a bad guy has stolen the Batmobile and has taken it to, uh, a run down factory.

This Floyd Mayweather and Conor McGregor fight will be promoted with ridiculous events like yesterday and then the fight will turn out to be a flop. (However, before you buy the pay-per-view, you better think about the possibility of how the fight might be tricked up and scripted so that something crazy will happen, thus, insuring a rematch for another huge payday.)

70 comments:

He also is part owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers. I hadn't heard from him in 20 years, but he just wanted to say hi.

You're referencing Bobby Patton, obviously, and this isn't the 1st time you've mentioned him at libarally lean blog.

What is the secret to Bobby's success? Grow up in a really nice area like Tanglewood or Westcliff in Fort Worth? Purchase a hospital (Osteopathic) from the government and then sell it back to another government entity? Exploiting a weakness in the government for your personal gain is the absolute definition of The Fort Worth Way.

I cannot believe the number of people on this blog that find it an acceptable practice for the sitting president and his family, who now hold in trust the future of this country, to have appearently conspired with an adversarial government on anything as basic to our democracy an election, and turn a blind eye allowing them to be above the law. Have the people of this country truely become so self centered & selfish that they ignore the basic principles of self government dating back to the Magna Carta? Or is this just poor stupid people in Wise county who never learned any better?

"Treason" became the byword of Democrats as soon as they saw the election returns last November. They didn't need anything concrete to use it, losing was enough. Their nitwittery kicked in almost immediately.

No doubt, Jeffress is there just to do "God's work." Jeffress looks like the Dramatic Chipmunk though significantly less relevant. Someone actually needs to photo edit and morph Jeffress and the Dramatic Chipmunk.

"They didn't need anything concrete to use it, losing was enough. Their nitwittery kicked in almost immediately."

The problem is that there is something concrete to it--more and more every day.

And now to believe that these meetings were of no consequence, did not result in the desired outcomes, or were on some other subjects, we have to take the word of the very people who lied all along and said there were no meetings in the first place. Several Trump associates are on record denying any meetings with Russians, and now some have had to resign, others have had to amend their statements, and still others have information revealed on a regular basis that they were lying.

Man, the extent to which you will go to divert attention from the truth is astonishing.

Bear--the person they were meeting with was known to have connections. You can't minimize it.

Sometimes, it is enough to conspire, to intend to do something that is illegal. They can't complain that they didn't actually get useful information (remember, in order to believe this, we have to believe the same people who said there were no meetings in the first place), when they went to the meeting believing it was a Russian gov't contact who had dirt on Clinton, and they wanted it to be true.

Why all the resistance? If this was a black man dealing crack in Wise County, you'd be all "if you don't have anything to hide, you should let them investigate". But now, where national security is at stake (this lobbyist is known for working deals to get rid of sanctions against Russia--and Russia was just sanctioned again by Obama at the time), you think there's nothing there despite the smoke that is thicker every day?

When will y'all see fire? Or can you admit that you simply don't care?

It is fascinating to watch the Trump Fifth Column swing into action each day as new information comes to light. There appears to be nothing bad that they can't explain away or minimize, in spite of the evidence. The sad thing is the damage it creates in this nation and around the world as people doubt the stability of our national leadership. If Pence doesn't step up soon, we are in danger of becoming the world's largest banana republic, thanks to Mr. Trump and his co-conspirators.

There's not any more aggression, or racism, or anything else "out there" than has existed before. There's probably less. The only difference is that today there are cameras everywhere and there is a means to share it with everyone, no matter how routine or common the event.

Holy Christ you Trump supporters are, at this point, worse than the democrats. You grew up and expect that from them, but when the shoe is on the other foot, your cognitive dissonance is unmatched. Donald Trump's own son released his OWN emails that said he was meeting with Russian attorneys regarding dirt on Hillary. If that isn't a textbook definition of interference (which is 100% illegal), then I don't know what is.

The screeching from the left the last 6 years over GOP obstruction is nothing to the tears that will be sure to engulf my Facebook feed over the next few years.

You have picked your side pal, we picked ours. This has never been about Trump but about fighting leftist ideology. The battle lines were drawn long ago and many good hard working people of this nation are sick and tired of the bullshit from the left. You are the fucking pathetic one.

Look, if I'm a candidate in an election for any office, me or someone associated with my campaign, can meet with anyone that might claim to have dirt on my opponent and it is not illegal. It doesn't matter who it is, it can be someone from the press, someone from a foreign government, someone from our government, my opponents own spouse or lover or former spouse or former lover. It doesn't matter: it is not illegal. This has been happening since elections began. Heck, as someone already brought up, the Clinton campaign met with officials from Ukraine government who supposedly had dirt on Trump. That is the exact same thing, yet that's not headline news!!!!!!! Get a grip people!!!!!

More impressed by the day that SWD is waking up to this kind of thing. The GOP should watch out, folks like him are the middle, and without them, they will not win elections nationwide and maybe not state-wide in traditionally red states.

But, SWD, you mention cognitive dissonance--and you're wrong there. His base knows what he's doing, and they just don't care. It's not that they have to convince themselves in spite of the clear evidence, its that they simply do. not. care.

Party above country, and decency, and Christianity, and integrity, etc...

It's not party above all else, it's stopping those who intend to destroy America at all else. If we have to get down in the gutter for a while, get dirty and do some things we may need forgiveness for later then so be it. We are at war here over ideologies and for the future. In Obama's America, or Clinton's America my children and grandchildren have no future. What I worked to build gets taken, my children forced to the back of the line. I am not going to set idly by and let that happen.

Call me racist, say I'm living in irrational fear, call me a nut, I don't care. I saw the policies, the rhetoric and hatred directed at us from the left change dramatically during Obama. I'm not willing to put my family last because of the sins of our country and out of guilt. Every society on earth has committed atrocities, it's not my job to make that right in America. It's my job to protect my family and ensure their future. And that is something I'm willing to fight dirty for!

Now that I've got all your attention, I'll link this, but I'll also cite the explicit statute, because I know none of you will actually follow the link because "Oh, it's from Cornell Univeristy and even though I don't know where that is on a map I know it's a liberal propaganda arm!"

(b)Contributions and donations by foreign nationals in connection with elections. A foreign national shall not, directly or indirectly, make a contribution or a donation of money or other thing of value, or expressly or impliedly promise to make a contribution or a donation, in connection with any Federal, State, or local election.

(c)Contributions and donations by foreign nationals to political committees and organizations of political parties. A foreign national shall not, directly or indirectly, make a contribution or donation to: (1) A political committee of a political party, including a national party committee, a national congressional campaign committee, or a State, district, or local party committee, including a non-Federal account of a State, district, or local party committee, or: (2) An organization of a political party whether or not the organization is a political committee under 11 CFR 100.5.

There's several more pertinent sections, but I'll end with the one that really leaves no ambiguity whatsoever and has been admitted to by Trump Jr's emails yesterday.

(2) No person shall knowingly provide substantial assistance in the making of an expenditure, independent expenditure, or disbursement prohibited by paragraphs (e) and (f) of this section (i)Participation by foreign nationals in decisions involving election-related activities. A foreign national shall not direct, dictate, control, or directly or indirectly participate in the decision-making process of any person, such as a corporation, labor organization, political committee, or political organization with regard to such person's Federal or non-Federal election-related activities, such as decisions concerning the making of contributions, donations, expenditures, or disbursements in connection with elections for any Federal, State, or local office or decisions concerning the administration of a political committee.

Stop lying to yourselves; Trump Junior very clearly broke the law. It's still yet to be determined if The President was aware of this. I would imagine it's highly unlikely that Junior was doing something like this, for his father, without his father's knowledge. I still want total proof. I'll let you mull that over and pull your hair out for a while. Even the GOP is starting to have a tough time defending against these accusations.

And to those of you saying this is a war: it's a war because you made it that way. You fight for discrimination against minorities on a daily basis (and not brown people, I'm talking about homosexuals). You fight for religious monuments on government property. You're not against Sharia Law, you'd be just fine with a Christian Theocracy. You're fine with a trillion dollar defense budget that the GOP will hamstring our grandchildren with funding, but los your shit when the left at least tells us how they want to pay for a funding increase. You fight for perpetual war under a the veil of patriotism, and continually send the poorest of your sons to die so defense contractors can turn another $100 million dollar profit. You fight against your own interests when you vote for people that won't spend money that has been proven to better society. You fight to keep taxes low for people so rich that 4 generations of their decedents will never know want. You fight against healthcare for everyone. The irony though is you are already in a socialized and subsidized group plan through your employer, because you're too blinded by "muh taxes!" to realize that a single payer system just takes the thousands of little employer pools and makes them one big pool.

All of these reasons I've listed above are why the GOP is very much dying. It's going to take a while, but it will happen in my lifetime. And you'll have nobody to thank but yourselves.

All of that has to do with MONEY. Don't you understand what expenditures are?

Oh yea, your girl Hillary has tons of egg (millions of dollars from foreign governments and corporations) on her face. OK for her but not for anyone else. Not that there is even the slightest hint that money is involved with the Trump debacle.

3:15--if I educated you bozos on every aspect of the law y'all got wrong I'd be here all day, every day. Look up the Logan Act, and read some campaign finance law, then google the concepts related to conspiracy to commit and attempt to commit certain crimes.

Gun to my head I vote for Trump over Hillary. Now that your painfully weak as hominem has been addressed, who won the election? Who is the president today?

Are you having such a hard time deflecting that you're contradicting yourself from one comment to the next? It sure appears that way. You literally just said the left is only worried about things that don't matter. Well guess what, Hillary isn't the president, therefore, whatever she did or did not do during the campaign, no longer matters. It's really pretty simple.

It's pretty sad, really. When I was growing up, the GOP was the party of morality and truth. Now it's just "THEY DO IT TOO!" Again, you people are pathetic.

Just spewing out talking points as if they were facts even though there are clear points to disprove everything you say. It's like the liberal playbook was literally shoved down your throat. In the real world things are far different than you paint it but wouldn't know, you haven't lived outside your protective bubble much.

-Cutting social welfare isn't racist, it's asking all able bodied folks to pull their own weight, gain some self respect and realize those Democratic handouts haven't done anything for your people but keep you tethered in chains to a new master.-Homosexuality is morally wrong, simple as that. Fighting against allowing it to become mainstream isn't discrimination. It's a lifestyle not a race.-Our laws, our nation were built with Christian principles in mind and symbols have adorned everything from our money to 10 commandments on government property....and that never prevented anyone from having religious liberty.-Your Sharia law/Christian Theocracy comment is pure hyperbole. -Massive defense budgets are necessary when 1) we police the world 2) Previous Democratic regimes have weakened us 3)Other nations won't properly fund to do so but wait for our rescue.-Nobody is fighting for perpetual war, supporting our troops isn't condoning war. -Fight against your interests...more hyperbole, more spoon fed talking points.-We fight to keep taxes low so we will have decent jobs. I'd rather defend job creators than welfare recipients.-Everyone already had access to healthcare, making it more costly and more of a hassle for low income didn't help anyone. It's driving up costs and not addressing the real problems. Obama care is a mess.-You work in group insurance, you have a job and part of your salary pays it. Making the little pools into a big pool with only a small percentage contributing is a recipe for disaster

All of my responses above are why the Democrats have lost all power. The Democratic party is very much dying.

Spanish War Donkey, good job on stating the issues clearly and factually. You are right on target. I am always amazed how some folks get themselves worked up and convince themselves that suppositions and lies are hard facts when that is not the case. Such seems to be the insanity that runs through Trump supporters today. Reminds me of the old western, The Ox-Bow Incident. A crowd of average citizens work themselves up into a lynch mob that hangs three innocent men for a murder and rustling. They are tired of recent cattle thefts and they are going to do something about it. They find out later their blind hate and refusal to think through certain things led to three innocent men losing their lives. That was a Hollywood movie, but people stepping forward to inflame, harangue, and play on our basest weaknesses are hiding in plain sight in the real world. Ask the families of the 605 adults and 304 children convinced by a charlatan named Jim Jones that they were on the only true path of righteousness and that "bad people" were out to get them, so drink his cyanide Kool-Aid to prove their dedication. And now President Trump says that all the media is out to get him and that the only reason you don't have the good life you used to enjoy is because of gays, illegal aliens, minorities, Muslims, and women who don't know their place. Very sad.

Any of you Trump Apologists ever think that maybe climate change is really God sending back Great Flood Version Two to clear out the nutjobs and wackos. He has given us many opportunities to save Earth, but instead we select a leader who says everything is fine. No need for laws controlling bad air, bad water, or abuse of natural resources, according to Mr. Trump.

So you begin the rebuttal with "you're using talking points". Very skillful. Now, let's address your "points". I'll also mention that you still couldn't rebuy my previous comment about Russian interference, you just deflect.

Where did I say anything about social welfare? Oh that's right, keep deflecting. This is very much a pot meet kettle thing with you.

Homosexuality is morally wrong to a group of people (the church) that have decided it is their job to legislate morality. Well guess what, you literally can't. "Judge not lest ye be judged.", remember? Oh wait, that's New Testament; the GOP is really much more Old Testament. Let's say we leave others' sins up to God, eh? Hypocrites.

You realize all the "In God We Trust" stuff came about during McCarthyism and the Red Scare, right? Oh wait, you probably haven't cracked a book in 30 years (I'm just saying that since you purport to know so much about me and if I call Trump a liar I MUST BE A DIRTY LIB!, but I'm sure you read).

"Your point about sharia Law/Christianity is pure hyperbole" after you LITERALLY THE SENTENCE BEFORE gave the tired "Christian nation" remark. That argument can literally be made for any religion. It's almost like if the founders wanted what the religious right wants they would've, oh, I don't know, explicitly stated such in the bill of rights. Kinda like our beloved 2nd amendment (yeah, I actually own lots of guns), "shall not" is also the operative wording in that pesky 1st amendment. Dammit, I know right?!

You aren't voting for perpetual war? Nah, only when the GOP in power is war okay. When Obama virtually continues GWB foreign policy for another 8 years, now we don't like it? I never said anything about supporting the troops; I made the point that the right is always ready for war so long as it isn't their kids going, kinda light during Vietnam.

45 million people didn't have health insurance (holy crap how can one person be so wrong on so many issues), and guess what, YOU WERE ALREADY SUBSIDIZING THEM. I'll type slow and use small words so hold my hand and follow along. You and your employer pay for your health insurance each month. You get sick, you go get treated, you get better. Now, some blue collar worker who's employer doesn't provide health insurance, or say, has 2 part time jobs for whatever reason, doesn't have health insurance. Same thing that happened to you happens to them, except they go to the ER, since they can't make an appointment without insurance. They pay like $50 when they get there, and that's it. Later on they get a bill for a couple thousand dollars, which they don't pay, because they can't. So the hospital isn't going to get paid for that patient. Tough luck, right? Nope, the hospital is just going to go to the one party that pays them. Can you guess who that is? Yeah, YOUR insurance company. A few months later, here comes the HR folks, talking about open enrollment, time to make changes, yada yada, blah blah. But wait! Now your rates are going up this year. But you don't care, it's only another $40/month. Who cares? Rinse and repeat this process, year after year. The only thing you to right in this comment is that Obamacare was a mistake. They should've butted up and gone single payer, but America wasn't ready for it.

For you last comment about the democrat party dying, I'm going to give you some comparison numbers; 66 to 63, 66 to 61, 70 to 60, 59 to 62, 51 to 50.5, 47 to 39, and 44 to 39. Those are election numbers (D vs R) going all the way back to 1992. Only in 2004 did a republican receive more votes. I thought before this cycle there was still time for the GOP to roll back its positions on stuff like gay marriage and abortion, but they doubled-down on the stupid, as evidenced by the fact that so many people here are defending a man that literally talked about sexual assault as if it were just something to do. The "moral" compass on the right is so far off it's just laughable at the irony at this point.

I'm familiar with that statute, Donkey, but to apply it the way you do (such that information from a foreigner is a "thing of value") I think would violate the First Amendment.

I mean, if you're right, let's say a Hillary campaign operative talked to a foreign national who works at Mira Lago. And she told that operative that Trump raped her (or whatever). And then said operative used that info in the campaign. Illegal? I mean, that would be nuts, right?

That's an hypothetical. Look, I personally hold not even a shadow of doubt that Hillary engaged in and has engaged in illegal and quite possibly (arguably) some treasonous shit in her career. Were she our president, and were the level of evidence there that is currently there for President Trump, I'd be barking up that tree. But the fact of the matter remains; Donald Trump is our president, and Hillary Clinton is not. You seem to be a reasonable person by your comment, as you clearly took the time to read my comment in its entirety, and actually give it ponderance; for that, I say thank you. I don't know what happened, nor do I purport to. Not any further than what has been presented as evidence thus far. But the fact remains that there is, thus far, a lot of circumstantial evidence, and some attorneys would argue hard, evidence that our president or at the very least his campaign team (and not appointees and advisors) engaged in illegal activity. That deserves investigation. If it does not, America is finished.

Donkey, I didn't mean to be distracting by using Hillary as an example. I mean, put in Dole or Newt or Gary Hart or whoever. My point is that I don't see how it could be illegal. Surely, a person has a free speech right to acquire information from someone (even a foreigner) and use it in an electoral contest.

Well going back over the statues I cited, it appears to me that it would indeed be illegal for a US citizen to receive any form of aide for any electoral reason from any foreign national. Were it two Americans, it's legit; we see it all the time with whistle blowers, sources, the media, etc.

I'm no legal scholar, so I'm not saying it is 100% for certain illegal, just that it reads that way to me. I'm sure you could find an equal number of attorneys that could argue it's legality one way or the other successfully.